


Ideal Mate

by FourOhFour



Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: F/F, Light Bondage, Oral Sex, Smut, Vaginal Fingering
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-01
Updated: 2018-10-01
Packaged: 2019-07-21 02:47:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,645
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16150940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FourOhFour/pseuds/FourOhFour
Summary: After the fall of the Reapers, Kasumi finds herself needing to reach out and make new connections in order to forget old wounds.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Try to forgive any grammatical errors or typos. I'll try to sift through and do a better job editing later on, but I kinda wanted to get this out quickly, as it's been a long time since I posted anything.
> 
> This story is actually in continuity with the other two, allowing for an expanded Mass Effect smut universe! I also have some ideas about where to take things from here. That being said, everything is a bit mad at the moment, so I don't know how long new work will take to get out.

“We didn’t actually meet at Shepard’s party, did we? Not properly.”

Samantha jumped at the feeling of breath whispering against her ear, but she recognized the voice, even if she couldn’t see the source. The fact that she didn’t recognize the voice made it obvious enough anyway.

“You spent most of it invisible,” Samantha said. “I barely even saw you until we did the group picture. I think I might have mixed you a drink?”

“Still can’t believe I let someone take my picture,” Kasumi said, shimmering into the visible spectrum. “I’m getting soft. Sorry if I was a little standoffish at the party. It’s… well I was going to say it was too crowded, but I don’t really have a problem with crowds. I just normally blend into them. Too many eyes on me, I guess.”

“I didn’t really notice. Like I said, I hardly even knew you were there, so it… didn’t really come off as rude.”

“Yeah, well…” Kasumi said. “You seemed nice, so I thought I should get to know you. People don’t like it when I get to know them by silently following them around, so I brought you a gift instead.”

Samantha’s eyes widened as Kasumi produced a wooden box, about a third of a meter wide, and another sixth of a meter long. The surface was covered in alternating squares, half a pale tan, the other half a deep blue. The gap between each square looked like it had been hand-carved into the wood in an impossibly intricate pattern before being stained jet black. Under each square along the wide end were letters A through H, and the rows of squares on top were labeled 1 to 4.

“Is that…?” 

“I didn’t really have to do any snooping to know you liked chess,” Kasumi said, flipping the box over to show the same pattern on the other side, with the numbers 5 to 8, allowing the box to unfold into a flat board. “And I also know that almost everyone prefers a physical board, and almost no-one has one.”

“And whose stolen property is it exactly?” Samantha knew Kasumi’s reputation well enough to know she hadn’t come about it legitimately. Part of her wanted to demand it be returned immediately. The rest of her found herself coveting it deeply. Every centimeter of the box looked like it had been labored over painstakingly until there wasn’t a single piece of it that wasn’t a masterpiece. In spite of the intricate lines that formed the grid of the board, she found herself drawn to the stain, wondering what it was exactly about that particular shade of blue that was so beautiful, and how it was that someone could make wood outshine gemstones. She almost understood why someone would take to stealing with treasures like that box in the galaxy. 

She knew Kasumi didn’t steal things because she loved art. She had a compulsion. The fact that a lot of worthless knick-knacks had gone missing after Shepard’s party spoke to a base need that had to be fulfilled, even if she didn’t actually want the items themselves. But she also had seen some holos of what the observation lounge looked like when Kasumi lived in it. The things she chose to take were all beautiful in some way, paintings, sculpture, literature. Sure, if you put Kasumi in a hardware store, she’d come out with her pockets filled with washers for no reason, but the things she chose to take, rather than the ones she took just to sate whatever need compelled her, were all art. Samantha figured that must say something about her.

“Uh… technically the Alliance, I guess?” Kasumi said. “It used to be General Petrovski’s. Shepard’s got that board that’s half-hologram for remote games or something she got from him. I figured that was probably his travel board, and he was the type to have at least a few better ones. The Alliance impounded all his stuff as evidence though, so I found it in one of their storage facilities.”

“Well that’s not so bad… they probably would have given it to you if you had Shepard ask. I know you’d never do that, but—”

Traynor cut herself off with a gasp as she opened the box and saw the pieces inside, each with a custom place in the velvet lining inside. The figures didn’t diverge much from the classic design, but each had been lovingly carved, the crowns on the king and queen showing impossibly finely crafted wood, and each piece inscribed with a unique flourish of carved patterns. 

“Thessian wood,” Kasumi said. “So, I’m gonna guess it was handcrafted by Asari. It looks like the sort of craftmanship you only get with biotic aid, and a couple hundred years of practice. Chess isn’t an Asari game, so I imagine he had this made custom. Petrovski may have been a bit of a hypocrite about the whole human superiority thing. Shocking, I know.”

“I-- Thank you, it’s beautiful. I—I don’t understand why… ?”

“Seemed like a good ice-breaker,” Kasumi said. “And it wasn’t any trouble for me. I had fun taking it. Now what do you say we play a game?”

#

Kasumi was relieved when she found herself playing black. She knew the first move held the advantage, but she also knew it wasn’t an advantage she’d be able to take. She knew the rules of the game, but she didn’t know it the way Traynor did. Taking the second move seemed like less pressure.

As much as Kasumi knew she was out of her depth in this match, she did enjoy the game. The way she saw it, the game had two aspects. The first was to keep one’s own guard up, the second was to find the holes in an opponent’s defenses. Kasumi’s life was mostly spent making sure her identity, everything about herself, was tightly locked away from prying eyes, while also trying to slip past the security of other people. She figured that at least put her in a better position than Shepard, whose military experience pushed her into trying to treat her pieces like an actual army.

Kasumi knew what the pieces really were. Where Shepard saw infantry, cavalry, and archers to be positioned like troops, Kasumi saw pieces of a burglary kit. Every piece had a purpose, a set of things it could do, or not do. Like breaking into a museum, the pieces had to be deployed in different ways and combinations to solve whatever puzzle had been set for them. They were tools to be deployed in whatever arrangement would allow her to slip in wherever she was least expected.

That was the theory anyway. In practice, her old skills didn’t apply. The idea of the pieces as tools in a kit only served as far as analogy. She could the tools of her trade like no-one else because of years, almost a lifetime of experience with them. She could think quickly about how to use them because of a lifetime of experience in how they fit together. She didn’t have that with chess pieces, and Traynor did. 

Instead of seriously trying to win, Kasumi opted to watch Traynor instead. She understood the game well enough to appreciate the way Traynor played it. She could see the ways in which Traynor managed to move her pieces to defend herself and attack at the same time, and Kasumi found it more fun to try and create situations that were designed less with an end-goal in mind, and more as puzzles to see how Traynor would work her way out of them.

Traynor was smart. She thought fast. And it seemed just when Kasumi thought she had the woman cornered in some small way, that she could at least exact a price for what was becoming a crushing defeat, she always seemed to slip out of it. Traynor made sacrifices here and there, but nothing major. Nothing that made it seem like Kasumi ever had her on the back foot.

Kasumi couldn’t help but feel as though Traynor was a bit wasted applying her skills to chess. And, Kasumi supposed, that communications research that had landed her on the Normandy. Perhaps not wasted. Yet still… 

“You know, I heard that not long before I showed up to Shepard’s little shindig that you had managed to break into the Normandy with a toothbrush,” Kasumi said. “I’d love to hear more about that.”

“I’m not telling you how to break into the Normandy.”

“I already know how to break into the Normandy, I just want to know more about how you did it.”

“I don’t doubt that you do, but I don’t see a good reason to expose more security flaws. Besides, that only worked because the toothbrush in question was a… rather expensive model.”

Kasumi smiled and waited until Traynor took her eyes off the board, so she could look directly into her eyes as she spoke. “You don’t think I can get expensive things?”

“I know you can,” Traynor said. “And I don’t particularly want to have to replace my toothbrush, so I’d rather not give you a reason to take it either.”

“I don’t take from friends,” Kasumi said, allowing herself the minor satisfaction of removing one of Traynor’s bishops from the board. “Not things that will be missed anyway.”

The feeling of the chess piece in her hand drove it home to her as the thought hit her brain that she could just… take it. It was already in her hand. It would be so easy. Normally she’d take a deep breath to try and calm herself, but she did want Traynor to be disturbed. She quietly palmed the piece and, when Traynor wasn’t looking, deposited it in the meager pile of other pieces she had captured, exactly where it was supposed to go.

The little slight-of-hand didn’t fool her brain though. She always hoped that a little bit of sneaking around in some harmless way would calm her down, but she knew nothing had been taken. But she had been telling the truth. She would never have taken something from Traynor, or anyone else from the Normandy. Especially not after seeing Traynor’s face when she saw the set.

When Traynor’s attention was on the board, Kasumi’s eyes started to dart around, seeing if there was anything else she could take. Whenever Traynor was looking at her she made sure she was relaxed and cool, that she smiled the little smug smile that normally came naturally. She didn’t like it when people saw her this way, and Traynor was clearly having fun. She’d set up the board in the Normandy’s observation lounge where she had stayed before. She’d stolen the glasses a lot, when the urge to take had been too much. She always bought new ones at the next port. She found she couldn’t take something and give it back, that was just… borrowing. But she could take things and replace them. And if the replacement was stolen as well, so much the better. And eventually the little pile of stolen glassware would get too big to hide, and the next time Zayeed was using the showers, she’d have the waste chute in his area eject it into space. One day future civilizations would happen across ancient glassware floating through space and wonder.

Someone had set up a poker table though. Strange that, after the Alliance got hold of the ship, they decided to add more vices to the bar area, instead of taking them out. Easy enough to lean back and vanish a poker chip while Traynor was distracted. Then another. Eventually an entire deck of cards was suddenly missing. That was enough to make her mind quiet again, at least for a while. She needed to take a new job. Taking the chess set for Traynor had been fun, but it had been child’s play. If she did a real job, something hard, she could go for weeks before her skin started to crawl again.

Meanwhile it turned out that taking Traynor’s bishop had been part of Traynor’s plan all along. Either that or she had adapted to it seamlessly. It had moved Kasumi’s knight just enough out of position for Traynor to crack through her defenses, and soon Kasumi found her king slowly marching across the board, fleeing certain doom at a rate of one square per turn, while Traynor’s rooks mercilessly closed in, never allowing it to turn the other direction, never allowing it to stop its motion, until finally it was pinned against the edge of the board, unable to run any farther.

“Checkmate,” Traynor said. “That was… actually not bad. I don’t mind kicking Shepard’s ass up and down the board, but it’s nice when someone makes it interesting. You could be really good at this.”

“I’d be happy to learn. I’m done flying on the Normandy, but I know Shepard brings her by the Citadel a lot. I can look you up when you drop by.”

“Actually, we’re on shore leave for a few months,” Traynor said. “Shepard’s doing well, but she’s had a couple minor issues, aches, pains, the odd bit of numbness. She got hurt pretty bad when the Citadel collapsed on her again and… no one outside of Miranda really understands how she’s put together any more, I guess. Miranda does what she can, but the doctors want a good, long look at her to make sure everything is fine. Half of the Mass Relays are still down, and these days the Alliance needs construction and transport ships more than stealth frigates. They figured we’d all earned the break.”

“And you’re spending it here?” Kasumi asked. The Citadel was recovering well, but it had been stuck for a while before anyone inside managed to get the arms open again. The damage inside hadn’t been bad. Mostly people had been confused, wondering why the Citadel had closed in the first place, and what was going on. A lot of humans had gone missing, silently abducted into the tunnels below where Shepard had reported the construction of another human Reaper taking place. No other damage from the Reapers, but apparently taking the stars away for so long had made a lot of people in the Wards go weird, and the Citadel wasn’t made to be away from its own nebula. It had taken even longer to repair the Mass Relay system enough to drag it back where it belonged, so its systems could go fully online again. Add to that the lack of imports causing food to start growing thing, and the fact that the Citadel had still been recovering from a Cerberus attack when it was moved, and things had gotten very ugly in places.

“We’re grounded long enough that some people are going off station. I thought about going back to Earth, but… I want to wait a little while. I don’t want to see my home like that again. I want it to get a bit better before I go back. Shepard’s place didn’t get touched by any of it, and she has enough space for a couple of small families to live there, so there’s room enough for me and James to stay at her place without having to share a bedroom. Or even sleep on the same floor as each other. Garrus and Tali are apparently in touch with each other right now, trying to find a common time they can both visit, and I wouldn’t miss that either.”

“I don’t think I want to miss that either,” Kasumi said.

“You’d be able to stay visible for all that?” Traynor said. She was clearly teasing, but she actually had a point.

“Well, I can visit when some of you are out. And visit again when different people are out. See everyone, just not all at once. …What about Ash, though? She’s still on the Normandy, right? You didn’t mention her.”

“Oh, Liara decided she could help co-ordinate Thessia’s recovery from the Citadel for a few months, so Ash is staying with her while she’s here. I’m sure they’ll come around to see everyone as well at some point. I guess Liara never actually needed to be on Thessia to help out, she just—”

“Didn’t need to be there in order to help, but she needed to be there. I understand,” Kasumi said. “Ash and Liara aren’t… Ash doesn’t swing that way. If she did… the girl has muscles, I’m just saying.”

Traynor laughed. “She’s not into women. Just Asari, unfortunately. I actually didn’t think you liked women that way either. You had a pretty singular focus on Jacob, I thought.”

“What can I say? I like muscles. I mean, not exclusively but… I’ve seen you look at Shepard, you know what I’m talking about.”

“Ah,” Traynor said, a little too quickly. “Well that’s just… I mean, I’m not serious about that but… I suppose I get what you mean, yes. James seems free though. And I’ve never seen you look at Shepard either.”

“Vega is sweet, but I think all those muscles are squeezing on his brain. And, honestly, it’s a little much. There’s a good middle ground that he kinda shot right past. As for Shepard… I dunno, I just don’t see her that way I guess. She’s… kinda like a big sister that keeps trying to get you into trouble, I suppose. And I did… appreciate Ash the few times I saw her, but unlike Jacob, I figured she wouldn’t enjoy hearing me talk about it. I guess I do mostly gravitate towards men, but… honestly, I’m not especially picky.”

“I understand,” Traynor said. “It’s… not any of my business, you don’t have to answer, but have you… ever…?”

Kasumi shook her head. “Not really. Almost with Kelly, the woman who had your job back in the day.”

“I do not have Kelly’s job,” Traynor said. “I’m a communication specialist. Kelly was… what did she do? Why not just have a VI?”

“Kelly was supposed to use her degree in psychology to make sure the crew moral was okay. Sort of an unofficial therapist. I think Cerberus figured she’d keep moral up by flirting with everything that moved. Joke’s on them. Apparently, she did a really good job helping some of lower decks types accept what was going on. I know she helped everyone who was abducted keep it together, in spite of being pretty traumatized herself,” Kasumi said. “But in the end… well she flirted with everything that moved. No judgement, I just like to feel special, so that wasn’t for me.”

Traynor nodded. “Well. I’d be happy to teach you to be better at chess. I know you’re too shadowy and mysterious to give me a number where I can reach you, but if you want another round, just call. Please call. Don’t just show up in my room or something. Call.”

#

Finding Ash was easy. She wasn’t Commander Shepard, but she was part of what some people called “Shepard’s Six.” Liara managed to mostly fly under the radar, in spite of that, but Ash being humanity’s second ever Spectre pretty much cemented her as a public figure. It was enough to make Kasumi wonder how many Spectres humanity would need before someone of them could actually work in secret. 

For now, however, Kasumi just enjoyed the fact that any time Ash entered a crowded area on the Citadel, someone would start screaming about it on the extranet. That made it easy enough to track her down. From there, it was a simple matter of following her. Simple.

Or it would have been simple, before Ashley stopped to buy wine, followed later by flowers. The fact that she was buying from parts of the Citadel where the security network wasn’t back online yet, and that she was paying with credit chits loaded onto anonymous cards, instead of a direct transfer from her account meant she was trying to surprise someone who was very hard to surprise.

What made it more complicated was trying not to laugh at Ash’s attempts to hide her purchases once she moved back into areas that had operational security cameras. Lt. Commander Williams had many skills, but subterfuge was not among them. Still, given the amount of effort Ash was going through, Kasumi figured she’d at least pretend to be surprised. Although if they were going to be melding their thoughts, which certainly seemed to be Ash’s intentions, maybe that wouldn’t be a possibility. Kasumi wasn’t exactly sure how it worked. 

She was almost tempted to slip in and watch. She’d given them plenty of privacy for when they really needed it, but Kasumi had the feeling there would be things like wine and dinner first. She knew it’d be wrong though. She barely even knew them. She knew Liara professionally, back when Liara had been a normal information broker, and briefly when they had been tracking down the Shadow Broker. She’d never really known Ash at all, save for seeing the both of them at Shepard’s party. Like with Traynor, she hadn’t properly spoken to either of them. It wasn’t that it was better to intrude on a closer friend, but at least they’d understand more.

Still, Kasumi wanted to intrude. They wouldn’t be the same with each other if they knew she was there. They wouldn’t have the same private, cute little moments. Kasumi was tired of playing the same little moments back for herself over and over again. She wanted more, even if that meant stealing them from others, and trying to force herself into them, like they were meant for her. She also knew it wouldn’t work, any more than sneakily moving objects into their proper places would convince herself she was stealing.

Instead, she just made note of the residence Ashley went into. She heard Liara’s voice for a moment before the door swung closed again, leaving her alone outside.

Kasumi thought about calling Traynor. Ashley and Liara would need a few hours at minimum. Plenty of time to get another game of chess in, maybe two, and come back. Somehow it felt wrong to go back to her so soon though. Kasumi seriously doubted that when Traynor had told her call she meant to call three hours later.

Instead Kasumi flashed a quick salute at the door, just in case Liara had a camera set up in a spectrum that could see her and went to buy herself some ramen.

#

“She stole you a chess set?”

“A really nice one,” Samantha said, holding it out for Shepard to see. “Apparently it used to be Petrovsky’s, and she thinks it’s Asari make.”

“Well, she’d know,” Shepard said. “She’s stolen and identified enough art from another cultures and periods that she could probably retire and become a museum curator with ease. She won’t, but she could. I still don’t understand why though. I didn’t think you even knew each other.”

“We didn’t,” Samantha said. “Something about her wanting to get to know me properly. It worked, I guess. We played a game and wound up talking for a bit about… well gossip, I guess. Our shore leave, Ashley and Liara. I got to hear a little about the kind of men she likes, a fling she almost had with Kelly Chambers… I don’t know what brought it up though.”

“Maybe she’s trying to recruit you into a life of crime,” Shepard said. “You did manage to break into the Normandy using nothing but a toothbrush.”

“She brought that up too. But I don’t think that’s it. Honestly, she seemed like she was just kind of lonely.”

“Well she definitely is,” Shepard said. “After her partner died… I know she had a little thing with Thane that she doesn’t talk about. I think that stopped when we all left the Normandy. Since then, I think she’s just been replaying old memories from her greybox. Dealing with that by reaching out to new people and trying to get to know them just… it seems like an awfully mature and healthy response for Kasumi.”

“I didn’t know about Thane,” Samantha said. “She never even mentioned him.”

“I think even most people who were on the Normandy then don’t know,” Shepard said. “Thane mentioned it to me once, when he was in the hospital. Kasumi’s never spoken a word about it to anyone that I know of. You probably shouldn’t mention you heard about it either. It wasn’t a normal relationship, but Thane made it sound like it wound up meaning a lot to him, even if they weren’t really a couple. I’d guess it meant something to Kasumi too. If it was just some pre-suicide mission fun, I think she’d talk more freely about it.”

“Well, she said she might want to visit. Not when everyone else is here, but she wants to see everyone again. Or at least you, Garrus and Tali.”

“Well she’s welcome to visit. Not that I could physically stop her from coming in anyway. It’d be nice to have her around more.”

Samantha nodded and tucked the chess set away in her room. It was starting to make sense to her why someone had through to put a psychologist on the Normandy, or at least an unofficial therapist with a vague degree in psychology. She’d always known that people like Jack and Miranda had issues, even if she’d only met them once they had, apparently, calmed down quite a bit. Kasumi though, she’d known Kasumi was… odd, but it never really occurred to her just how much she was keeping concealed.

She hoped Kasumi would call again.


	2. Chapter 2

Kasumi wound up on Liara’s doorstep several hours later. Waiting had been painfully boring, even after Kasumi belatedly realized she had lifted a deck of cards from the Normandy and could play Solitaire on the table tops near the little Japanese place she’d found herself by. It should have been more than enough time for Ash and Liara to have a nice romantic dinner and do whatever else it was they needed to do though.

Kasumi knocked. 

No answer.

Surely it had been long enough? Kasumi checked the clock. She had waited four mind-numbing hours She tried to remember how long Ashley would have been away on the Normandy before getting back, but she wasn’t even sure when the relationship had started. Kasumi wasn’t a stranger to dry spells though, and figured that, if anything, the longer Ashley had been away, the sooner they would be finished.

Kasumi knocked again, harder this time. 

After a few moments the door opened a crack, and Ash’s face poked through. The state of her hair alone made it obvious that Kasumi had been right to give them some privacy, but she didn’t show any signs of recent exertion. Still, in spite of the door barely being open, she could tell that Ashley was wearing nothing more than a robe. Kasumi’s best guess was that they were either very big on cuddling or had fallen asleep after.

“Kasumi,” Ashley said, looking her up and down. “No. I don’t care why you’re here just… no.”

“I’m not here for you,” Kasumi said. “I need to talk to your girlfriend.”

“Yeah, I thought I was pretty clear,” Ash said. “A. No. B. I don’t care. Oh, and C. No.”

“It’s fine, Ash,” Liara’s voice said from somewhere back inside the apartment. “I’ve got another robe here somewhere, just let me find it.”

“You really don’t have to—” Ash said. 

“Found it!”

“Oh god damn it,” Ash said, giving Kasumi a death stare savage enough that Praetorians were the only frame of reference Kasumi had for it, even as she opened the door properly. “Come in, I guess, not like you’re interrupting…”

“She’s not interrupting though,” Liara said, walking in, now similarly robe-clad. “We were just napping.”

“You were napping,” Ash said. “I was watching you nap, and I was not even remotely finished.”

“We have two entire months for you to watch me sleep naked in,” Liara said. “You’ll survive a small break. I think I have some restoration business I want to talk to Kasumi about anyway.”

Ash shook her head. “Fine. I’m gonna take a shower. A long shower. Long enough that if you wrap this up quickly, you could join.”

“Don’t make it too hot!” Kasumi called after Ash as she left. “The steam fogs up my camera lenses!”

“Don’t antagonize her,” Liara said. “She’s waited a long time for this, and she’s probably afraid you’re going to get me involved in something. Though I’m sure you must have found out about this place by following her here, so I do appreciate your discretion in waiting. I assume you’re hoping the Shadow Broker has work for you?”

“Pretty much, yeah,” Kasumi said. “I want to stick around while people I know are in-town, but I’m running out of decent targets. I want something challenging. I was hoping you knew about some collections people are less… open about admitting they have. I’m less interested in the reconstruction stuff.”

“Fortunately, we can do both,” Liara said. “Thessia’s reconstruction isn’t just about homes, industries and farmland. Those things are important. Vital. But we can rebuild homes and factories. We can restore the land. There’s some things that can’t be replaced. Things that make Thessia a homeworld, instead of just a patch of ground where our ancestors happened to be born.”

“I get it,” Kasumi said. She hadn’t been back to Earth since the war, but she had an image in her head of a Reaper stomping on an ancient Buddhist temple in Japan. She’d found herself making sure a lot of the Japanese pieces she stole didn’t go to alien buyers lately. She hadn’t cared where they wound up before, back when there was enough history to share.

“It’s bad on Thessia. Probably Palaven too, but… I can only worry about so many worlds, and I know Palaven is in good hands with Garrus. You have to understand; the Reapers leave the artifacts of one race reasonably intact for the next cycle. If they hadn’t been destroyed, humanity would have been the exemplar of past civilization for the next cycle. The relays, the Citadel, they would have believed your people made them. The rest of us would have been footnotes in history, if anything. I know the Reapers were horrible to Earth, but on Thessia they were trying to wipe out any trace that the Asari even existed. The fact that there… may have been Prothean influence in our past made it all the more important to destroy our oldest cultural sites first. We need as much of our heritage back as we can get.”

“Meanwhile Asari art and artifacts have soared in price, given the sudden decrease in supply,” Kasumi said. “And trade has gone underground because collectors are afraid the Council will rule half of their pieces are suddenly the property of some Asari city-state.”

“Exactly,” Liara said. “No governing body on Thessia can buy black market artifacts, obviously, but they are valuable enough that if a master thief were to come to possess some, it would not strike anyone as odd if the Shadow Broker sold information on how to contact her to a wealthy Asari patriot. Nor would it seem at all odd if these artifacts were then donated back to Thessia. Obviously, given trade in such things has gone underground, it would be very hard for anyone to prove those artifacts were ever stolen property.”

“I usually like to set up sales myself, but I suppose it’s for a good cause, and I really just need a job to do.”

Liara nodded. “The Broker will forward you the information. If anyone asks, you traded information for it in return. Best to be vague on what that information was.”

“Reasonable,” Kasumi said. “Do you talk about yourself in the third person a lot these days?”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Liara said. “I’m just one of the Broker’s many contacts. The Broker simply sees an opportunity for profit by selling information about how to obtain these artifacts to interested buyers but would prefer it not be known that information about how to reacquire these artifacts was given out for free.”

“Ah,” Kasumi said. It was probably overly paranoid, but this apartment wasn’t normally where Liara worked from. Kasumi had no doubt that Liara had checked it for bugs about a hundred times already, but she figured it couldn’t hurt to be careful. 

“If that’s all you need, I would love to catch up, but that offer about the shower is fairly tempting. We can meet again later, if you like.”

“I—” Kasumi wasn’t quite sure how to answer. She didn’t really know Liara outside of work meetings. She supposed the fact that they’d both been on the Normandy made them part of the Shepard family now, but she hadn’t really expected Liara to see her as anything but a contact.

She hadn’t really been expecting herself to see Liara as anything more than a contact either. That was probably why she hadn’t properly guarded the words from coming out of her mouth at the surprising shift in their relationship, the one thing that had been nagging at her since she heard about Ash and Liara. 

“Ashley is going to die. You know that right?”

“I’m sorry?”

“I don’t mean now,” Kasumi said. “Or soon. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said anything. They say Asari are good at dealing with that, but… I’m sorry.”

“It’s all right,” Liara said. “Yes. I know I’m going to outlive her. And I’m sorry about Thane.”

“Nothing to be sorry about,” Kasumi said. “We both knew. Didn’t think he’d get killed with a sword, but it was probably only the difference of a few months.”

“Of course you knew,” Liara said. “That’s why I said I was sorry about Thane, not Keiji. I’m sorry about Keiji too, of course. But you never signed up for him to die, so you’re not left wondering why you thought you could handle it.”

“Thane wasn’t like that. We were both lonely, so we decided to be lonely together. That’s all.”

“Even if that was all, that’s a long way from nothing,” Liara said. “And so you want to know what my plan is, for when Ash is gone.”

Kasumi didn’t trust herself enough to speak.

“There really isn’t one, Kasumi,” Liara said. “The way my people deal with knowing we’ll outlive our lovers is… we don’t really think about it. It’s not easier for us when they die. And, assuming Ash and I are bonded for life, I’ll be heartbroken when dies. Even if it doesn’t last, I will be anyway. It’s not really that different for your species. You outlive your pets, but you don’t spend every moment with them thinking about it.”

“I don’t think it’s really the same.”

“It’s not exactly the same, but most humans don’t seem to love their pets any less than their spouses,” Liara said. “They just don’t love their pets romantically. But your people still get pets. And when the pet dies, they often get another, even though they know exactly what they’re in for. And I’ve never known a human who felt that it would have been better not to have their pet than to lose their pet.”

“So. You’re saying I should get a cat.” Kasumi said.

“You know I’m not. But, honestly, I don’t really think you should be responsible for having to… regularly feed anything. You’re not the most consistent person I’ve met.”

“Yeah. No. That’s fair.”

Liara shook her head slightly. “I’m going to let you be silly about this, because I know that’s just… what you need. I’m just saying, the version of you from the past who thought getting attached to Thane would be worth the loss? She was right. The version of you now, who thinks she can’t handle it? She’s wrong. One day you’ll be glad for the memories. And I know about that chess set you stole. You might even believe yourself when you say that was just to make an introduction, but I know better.”

“Maybe,” Kasumi said. “I suppose I didn’t steal gifts for anyone else, but… well it was a good way to get closer to her. Maybe I just wanted to as a friend. I don’t even know how I feel anymore.”

“You know Kelly Chambers is still on the station,” Liara said. “She’s changed her name and hair back.”

“If I wanted to sleep with Kelly, I would have slept with Kelly. She liked me well enough; I only had to ask.”

“I meant as a therapist.”

“You know she’s not a real therapist, right?”

“She does well enough. And you won’t visit a real one.”

Kasumi laughed. “Thanks, Liara. I’ll look for your message.”

#

“All right,” Samantha said. “I guess we should probably start with openings. There’s a lot of them. A lot, a lot. And it’s best not to follow them too slavishly. But once you learn the basic structure, you can play around with it as you need to. This… may be a little rough, I’ve never actually taught anyone before. I’m glad you called though. I think you have a lot of potential.”

Kasumi smiled as she lazily straightened one of the pieces of the board. Something about her reminded Samantha of a cat. She supposed that describing a thief as being cat-like wasn’t exactly original, but it was less her stealth that made Samantha see her that way. After all, she never noticed when Kasumi was being stealthy, that was the point. But something about the way she seemed to want to curl up in the corner of the sofa was part of it. There was also a self-satisfaction that some cats seemed to have. Samantha also knew that cats could be shy. They weren’t socially oriented the way a dog was. Many were still very attached to their owners, but very much on their own terms. But they could also be skittish and shy. Samantha knew you had to be very still, and very gentle to get some cats to come out of hiding. She couldn’t imagine what she had done to attract Kasumi.

“I was actually thinking the same about you. You’re smart… good with tech…”

“I’m not helping you steal things,” Samantha said. “But the offer is flattering.”

“Not even stealing Thessia’s cultural heritage back?”

“It sounds very noble, but not for me. Though if you’re in a teaching mood, I do have a question. Shepard uses cloaking tech like you do, but she can’t stay undetected for more than a few seconds. I’ve never heard of anyone staying invisible as long as you do.”

Kasumi grinned, and Samantha did not, even for a moment, believe that the way Kasumi tilted her head, so only her teeth and her eyes gave off enough light to be seen was accidental. 

“Well I’m me. You can only expect so much out of others,” Kasumi said. “But Shep could probably stay cloaked a lot longer if she didn’t insist on using hers while she’s being shot at. Even I can’t manage too much under fire.”

“I didn’t realize that made a difference.”

Kasumi vanished and re-appeared next to Samantha, moving close enough to Samantha could see her omni-tool.

“It doesn’t change anything about the device, it’s just hard to concentrate when people are shooting at you,” Kasumi said. “Or even just shooting near you. It’s very loud. You have to make a lot of little adjustments, or the whole field falls apart. I can pretty much do it indefinitely, so long as I don’t get into firefights. Shepard never really seemed to learn that trick. Here, try it.”

Kasumi took a module off of her omni-tool and plugged it into Samantha’s, passing her a shield generator at the same time. Samantha opened her mouth to object, but she figured playing with Kasumi’s tech couldn’t hurt. It wasn’t as if Kasumi could make her go along on robberies if she did.

She’d figured that cloaking would be hard, but she wasn’t quite prepared for how difficult it was. She understood the theory of the cloaking technology. She’d even studied it a little, as it related to communications. The shield was modified to register the impact of photons on any point of its surface and shoot out an identical photon on the other side. The principles behind it were surprisingly similar to how com buoys used mass effect fields to bend signals at FTL speeds. Unfortunately, com buoys operated in a vacuum. A lot of the adjustments she needed to make seemed to be focused around humidity, tiny shifts in the wind, and other factors that would change on a dime. Worse still, the cloak didn’t alter or block incoming light, it simply detected and replicated it. There was no visible indication of when she was or wasn’t cloaked, save some field efficiency readouts on the omni-tool. Eventually she realized she could see her reflection in the window, and saw herself flickering in and out of being, her image being distorted, hue shifted, or otherwise wrong the majority of the time as she drifted between complete visibility and invisibility. She couldn’t look at her reflection for long, however, as she had to tear her gaze away from the readouts to do so and lost any sense of what adjustments had to be made.

“How do you do this and… walk?” Samantha said. 

Kasumi tapped the side of her head, near her eyes. “The implants help. I can see all the readouts as overlays on the real world, so I don’t have to stare at the omni-tool. I’ve also got a lot of haptic stuff built into my gloves, so I can do adjustments just by moving my fingers. Which is still not great when I need my hand for something, but it’s all sort of a balancing act. Once you learn the basic structure, you can play around with it as you need to.”

Samantha handed Kasumi her equipment back. “I don’t really need to be invisible though. It’s interesting, but probably not something I’m going to devote the time into learning. I know you weren’t serious anyway.”

Kasumi shrugged slightly. “I mean, I didn’t expect you to say yes, but I am being serious. I think you could be good at what I do, if it were the sort of thing you wanted.”

“And coming to learn to play chess isn’t just you hoping that if you get into my good graces, I’ll agree to be your new partner in crime?”

“Not in crime, no…”

Samantha stammered for a moment, not sure how to respond. Kasumi was surprisingly nice for a master criminal, and quite pretty, from what little of her face Samantha had been able to see. It wasn’t an inherently unattractive idea, but it had somehow managed to completely blindsight her.

“Or, if not, I’m still happy to learn chess,” Kasumi said. “I could always use another friend, if that’s all you want.”

“I… it’s very sweet,” Samantha said. “But I’m really not cut out to be a criminal.”

“I don’t need you to be,” Kasumi said. “I don’t see Ash doing a lot of Shadow Brokering. Keiji and I were partners in a lot of ways, but it doesn’t have to be like that.”

“Well… I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to get to know you a little better,” Samantha said. She’d never really considered Kasumi that way before, but she really did seem sweet. Samantha didn’t approve of stealing in general, but Kasumi’s targets seemed harmless enough. She didn’t seem to be hurting anyone who couldn’t take it. It wasn’t entirely moral, but Samantha had a hard time feeling strongly about it. “If we went on a date, what exactly would that look like?”

Kasumi smiled again, and Samantha thought she saw just a bit of a predatory edge to it. 

“Let me show you.”

#

Kasumi’s date wasn’t entirely legal, but Kasumi was relieved to see that Traynor, in spite of some reservations, seemed to have decided it was harmless enough.

The museum was dark, but it didn’t it was nothing Kasumi’s eye implants couldn’t handle, and Traynor seemed perfectly willing to be lead through the hallways by Kasumi as she moved from exhibit to exhibit, only turning the lights on around whatever they needed to look at.

“This one’s my favorite,” Kasumi said, as she turned the lights on around a painting. “At least of the non-human stuff. It’s Quarian, from right after the fall. Quarian paintings are rare enough, they usually prefer textiles, but even so, this is special. What little art they have from that time is usually so… sad.”

“It’s beautiful,” Traynor said. “… It is a little sad though.”

The painting was clearly supposed to be an oil painting of Rannoch, but heavily abstracted, full of swirls, and exaggerations, and the shape of the planet ever so subtilty distorted, as if flying away from it at relativistic speeds.

“Bittersweet,” Kasumi said. “Most of the work from this time is about loss. Fair enough. This one is about Rannoch. The fact that they lost it is part of it, sure, but the focus is on how beautiful their world was. The sort of beauty you don’t always see until it’s gone.”

Kasumi put an arm around Traynor as she learned into her.

“So, you didn’t steal this one?”

“Years ago.”

“This is a fake?” Traynor said. Kasumi could see the hint of a pout on her face, one Traynor probably didn’t entirely realize Kasumi could see through the darkness.

“I prefer to say it’s not the original,” Kasumi said. “You wouldn’t say a copy of Moby Dick was fake because it wasn’t first edition. If I never told you it was a reproduction, you wouldn’t think it was any less beautiful. Having the original is just rich people trivia and bragging rights. Everything important about the painting is still here.”

“What about all that stuff you were going to steal back for the Asari?”

“If anyone has a claim to the originals, it’s them,” Kasumi said. “I’m not going to say having the original isn’t nice. If it wasn’t, I wouldn’t take them. But when it comes to just appreciating the art, you don’t need it.”

Kasumi felt Traynor’s arm slide around her and pull her a little closer.

“Is this always how you look at them? After closing time?”

“Pretty much,” Kasumi said. “It’s nice that everyone gets to come in and see the art, but it’s not the same when other people are around. Other people you don’t want, anyway.”

“I like it,” Traynor said. “It’s hard to get quiet like this on Earth. Hard to get places like this on the colonies.”

“Hard on the Citadel too. We should probably go soon. The night watch will be getting to this floor pretty soon. Not really a problem for me, but… well it’s getting late anyway. I should get you back to Shepard’s.”

“Well,” Traynor said. “I don’t absolutely have to go back to Shepard’s…”


	3. Chapter 3

Kasumi could tell Traynor was starting to be a little tired of being lead around as she showed her into the hotel room she had on the Citadel, so she let her go once 

It wasn’t the best room. Kasumi had gotten tired of using her wealth to rent fancy hotel rooms a long time ago. But it was large enough, and serviceable without being ostentatious. Kasumi was almost going to miss it when she left it in a few weeks, but it didn’t do to stay in one place too long, and the Citadel was nothing if not full of hotels to use.

“It’s not as nice as Shepard’s place,” Kasumi said. “But it’s a place to sleep.”

Traynor held up a finger as she looked at something on her omni-tool. 

“I don’t want to tell you how to do your job, but I do have a degree in—ah!”

Traynor walked over to the dresser drawer and, with a little help from her omni-tool, removed a screw from the inside of the handle.

“Fortunately, no one knows a quantum entanglement communicator quite like I do,” Traynor said. “The signal is impossible to detect, but you can’t make it entirely passive. Sorry, Liara. I know you probably weren’t going to listen to this anyway, but…”

Traynor tossed the screw into the minibar and smiled at Kasumi. “I wouldn’t be worried. Liara’s the only person who could pull off something like that. But now that we know we’re alone…”

Kasumi stood still and let Traynor push her hood back. It was about the polar opposite of showing up in Thane’s bedroom, naked but for ropes, but she wanted something else from Traynor. Something different, if not necessarily any more, or any less.

“It’s a shame you don’t let anyone get a good look,” Traynor said, running a hand through Kasumi’s short, black hair. “But I can’t say I mind that I get this view all to myself… Have you been with a woman before?”

“Never.”

“I guess I get to show you more than chess then.”

Kasumi closed her eyes as Samantha pulled her in more closely and kissed her. It wasn’t that Kasumi forgot how it felt. She remembered every kiss since she got her greybox. But she had forgot what it felt like to have a new one, to not know how things would go. That Samantha was so much smaller than her other lovers added further to the novelty, and as they pulled apart, Kasumi was hit by a very faint scent of juniper berries.

“I could get very used to not having to crane my neck to do that,” Kasumi said. 

Samantha just smiled and started pushing Kasumi back towards the bed, fumbling at the clasps on Kasumi’s clothing. Her lips burned on Kasumi’s skin as Samantha moved from kissing her lips to making all-to-brief excursions to her neck and shoulder, all the while caressing every part of her skin. Kasumi, for her part, surrendered to Samantha’s machinations, letting herself move as she was pushed. Before she had always taken the lead, at least at the outset, but it felt good to relax, and let Samantha’s affections wash over her. Still, when the opportunity arose she took the chance to kiss her back, enjoying the smell of her perfume each time she moved in, and slowly removing her uniform, being careful to move slowly, keeping pace with Traynor’s attempts to remove Kasumi’s somewhat atypical attire.

Content as Kasumi was to follow Samantha’s lead, she couldn’t entirely help herself. As soon as the top half of Traynor’s uniform was removed, Kasumi ran a hand down her side, while the other moved to the clasp of her bra. Kasumi still found it useful to pockpocket every now and again, keycards, ID badges and the like, and she imagined, if she was good, she could do the same here. And she was very good. 

As with all things, the key was misdirection. As Kasumi caressed Samantha’s back with one hand, the other moved towards her trousers, fiddling with the buckle of her belt. She made sure to be just a little clumsy, jostle her just a little bit whenever she tried to unfasten the shoulder straps from her bra. Even for Kasumi, it took a few attempts. The shoulder straps weren’t designed to be casually unhooked from the back of the bra, and, light fingered as Kasumi was, it wasn’t something she had practiced, but eventually Kasumi had managed to get them unfastened. 

The misdirection worked almost too well for the big finish. Kasumi pulled Samantha in for a deep kiss as she slid a hand around to her backside, startling her with the sudden assertiveness. Kasumi found herself so lost in the embrace, she almost forgot to unhook the back of the bra. Still, it came undone easily enough and Kasumi was able to deftly remove it and toss it into the corner while Samantha was distracted. 

Samantha gasped in surprise as Kasumi’s hands moved to her chest, caressing her softly. 

“How…?”

Kasumi grinned and pulled back a little bit, staring into Samantha’s eyes, and making sure she would notice as Kasumi’s gaze broke contact for a moment, sweeping over her body, Kasumi’s smile only getting larger as she came back to Samantha’s eyes. “Remember who you’re dealing with…” 

Samantha brought her own hands to Kasumi’s chest. Kasumi was already completely exposed from the waist up, having always found her armor provided plenty of support by itself. Kasumi’s sigh as Samantha’s thumbs worked their way around the soft buds of her nipples had started as an attempt at theater, but almost immediately became entirely genuine.

“You really can’t trust someone like me with their hands,” Kasumi whispered into Samantha’s ear, pausing to pull her earlobe gently between her lips. “Best tie them up, or they’ll get into all kinds of trouble…”

Samantha laughed for a moment but stopped as she looked at Kasumi’s face. 

“You’re serious about that?”

“It’s an option,” Kasumi said. “Not something I need… but something I very much appreciate, if you’re comfortable with it.”

“I’d never thought of it before. It could be interesting. But what if I want your hands to get into trouble?”

“Well, you can let them. But if you later decide you prefer them tied to the headboard, I won’t fight you.” Kasumi leaned in to whisper again. “We’ll keep it simple for now… no safe-words, just plain yes or no. But if another time you want me to fight a little… well I’m sure we’ll have a lot to talk about.”

“I’ve never done anything like that,” Samantha said. “But the way you put it does have a certain… appeal.”

Kasumi just focused her efforts on Samantha, slowly caressing her, enjoying the warmth of her skin, only removing the last of her clothing once Samantha had already stripped her entirely. She started to move back to admire the result, but as she did so, Samantha gripped her by the shoulders and gently, but quite firmly, pushed her down, onto the bed, keeping her down by straddling her hips to keep her firmly on the bed. It was something Kasumi had done to Keiji many times, but she was deeply enjoying being on the receiving end. She could feel Samantha’s weight shift as she reached for something on the ground, eventually coming back up with her belt.

“Excellent choice…” Kasumi said, raising her hands, wrists together. Samantha quickly looped the belt around both Kasumi’s wrists, and one of the slats that formed the headboard, pulling Kasumi’s arms above her head as the belt tightened. In spite of her promise not to struggle, Kasumi couldn’t help but squirm a bit as she instructed Samantha on how to knot the belt, and keep it tight, enjoying the feeling of both her immobility, and of her skin against Samantha’s. 

“Okay,” Samantha said, cupping Kasumi’s breasts. As she brought her thumb and forefinger over Kasumi’s nipples, she could tell that Samantha was holding back from adding a little more pressure, gently squeezing, wanting to pinch. “We are definitely going to do more of this later. I want to feel you struggle for real.”

“Next time,” Kasumi said. They’d have to do a lot of talking about where their comfort zones were before they could go too far. And the way Samantha’s eyes would light up, discovering unexpected new pleasure whenever Kasumi mock-struggled below her was pushing Kasumi well beyond the point of reasoned conversation, as well as making her achingly aware of her current inability to gain any satisfaction, except at Samantha’s whim.

Fortunately, it appeared Samantha was feeling benevolent, as she slid her hand between Kasumi’s legs, eliciting a soft, low moan. Still Samantha was slow with her ministrations, spending as much time on the inside of Kasumi’s thighs as trailing her fingers lightly over her lips. Kasumi couldn’t tell if she was teasing on purpose, or severely over-estimating the amount of foreplay Kasumi required at the moment. Kasumi tried to thrust herself more firmly against Samantha’s hand, but the way Samantha had her pinned down limited what she was able to do.

“If you’re good,” Samantha said. “I’ll untie your hands when it’s your turn. Otherwise, you’ll have to find a way to make do the way you are.”

As was so common in her life, Kasumi found herself torn about if she wanted to be good or not, but, with not inconsiderable effort, forced herself to be still, or at least not actively try to pull more out of Samantha than she was willing to give.

Kasumi was swiftly rewarded with a lingering kiss, and a little extra pressure, though still not nearly enough. Kasumi wasn’t quite able to back a few frustrated grunts as Samantha continued to step up the stimulation, but never quite enough, her fingers trailing near to Kasumi’s clitoris, never quite touching. 

Kasumi resisted the urge to beg as Samantha’s fingers started to probe around her entrance, but she needn’t have worried, as Samantha slid a digit inside her with ease, followed shortly by another one, and Kasumi swiftly found that she wouldn’t have been able to make any articulate speech if she had wanted to.

“All right,” Samantha said. “I think you’ve had enough warmup.”

Samantha released the weight pinning Kasumi’s legs down as she maneuvered herself to lie between Kasumi’s legs, still stroking her with her fingers as she brought her lips to Kasumi’s clitoris, gently sucking her inside, and lavishing her with attention from her tongue.

Kasumi gave in. She knew she wouldn’t last long this way. She didn’t bother trying to control herself, and gave into the feelings, making no effort to keep herself from buckling under Samantha’s touch, even as she half-worried that should she become too animated, Traynor might stop. 

Just as she felt like she couldn’t stand any more, Kasumi came, her breath catching in her mouth as she rode out wave after wave of pleasure, finally coming out as a whimper when her body became her own again, save for a few lingering aftershocks.

“Well,” Samantha said, untying Kasumi’s hands. “You were very good, but after a display like that, I think you should finish what you started.”

Kasumi nodded slightly, gently rolling Samantha onto her back, even as her own head still seemed to be filled with fog. She kissed Samantha, working her way down from her lips, making a brief diversion to attend to each of her nipples in turn for a few moments before continuing the work her way down to her pubis, running a hand through the coarse hair she found there before gently parting Samantha’s lips with her fingers.

Kasumi wasn’t entirely sure what she was doing as she started to lick and kiss at Samantha’s folds. Each partner she’d had before, Keiji, Thane, and a small number of minor flings from before, had different tastes, responded to things differently. She was well accustomed to having to work out a new partner’s desires, but it had been a long time since she’d felt such a basic inexperience. 

Still Samantha made it easy, reaching down to run her hands through Kasumi’s hair as she worked, guiding her with them as needed, or letting Kasumi know what was working, either through explicit acknowledgement or soft sighs, that Kasumi knew to be a small exaggeration, meant to communicate more than involuntary noises, but that didn’t make them less appealing. Still when Kasumi hit on something that forced a proper grunt from Samantha it produced a far deeper thrill, especially as she glanced up to see the hint of a blush on Samantha’s face at the less dignified sounds being forced pushed from her. 

Ultimately it didn’t take Kasumi long to work out how to please her new lover. She knew what worked on herself, even if she’d never tried it on another before, and Samantha was an excellent guide, even if her climax was more reserved, signaled primarily through a tighter grip on Kasumi’s hair, not quite pulling. Kasumi watched in satisfaction as her entire body went rigid for a few moments, before relaxing enough she looked like she might melt into the mattress, even as she gasped for breath, coughing slightly from her quiet exertions.

Kasumi moved to be level with Samantha again, holding her close, waiting for her to get her breath back. 

“I don’t believe you’ve never done that before...” Samantha said eventually.

“Not that exactly. Not so different from cracking a safe open, really. I mean, except for being different in every way. Still, I’m good at probing things out, seeing what makes them tick and… uh… exploiting their vulnerabilities. Though I think you were particularly good at exploiting today.”

Samantha laughed, glancing at the now discarded belt. “I knew that was a thing people did. I never thought might about it either way. I’m starting to see why some people like it now. Besides you’re always so… I don’t know… you’re sweet, but I know you’re putting on airs, pretending to be all suave. Making you break down was especially fun.”

“Well, you’ll make an excellent dom,” Kasumi said. “And maybe a sub if you’re into that. I can go either way.”

“Do I have to learn a bunch of special lingo now?”

“You’re a communications specialist,” Kasumi said. “You’ll be fine. Though if we want to do anything serious, we need to have some safety talks, ground rules, negotiations… It’s not always exactly sexy, but it’s not bad. You just have to set some time aside for it.”

“Time you’re probably not going to have, if you’re going to rob all those people for Liara,” Samantha said. “I’m not in a rush. Though if there’s any special handcuffs or something I should buy while I wait, let me know. I can’t screw up all my belts doing this.”

Kasumi pulled her a little closer, enjoying the soft warmth. “You know… I felt like I was going to have to do all of that right away. As soon as humanly possible. And I’m still going to have to do it…”

“I’m not really expecting you to change,” Samantha said. “Just try to be… as good as you can, doing what you do. And try not to implicate me in anything.”

Kasumi laughed slightly. It was, she realized, the first laugh she’d had in a while that wasn’t, as Samantha had called it, putting on airs. “I know. What I mean is… I felt like if I didn’t do a job, I was going to jump out of my skin. Right now, though… I think I have a little time before it’s going to start taking a strong moral principle to prevent me from stepping into the street and methodically picking people’s pockets. The artifacts aren’t going anywhere. Or if they do, I’ll track them down again. Thessia doesn’t need them this second.”

Samantha didn’t respond, instead just curling close to Kasumi. Kasumi could tell that she’d drifted off to sleep sometime while she’d been talking. 

It was a bit of a stretch for Kasumi to reach her omni-tool without moving so much as to disturb Samantha, and the hotel would probably be a little unhappy with Kasumi creating and overload in the lightbulbs to turn them off, rather than getting up and walking to the switch, but as she drifted off in Samantha’s arms, all Kasumi knew was that it had been worth it.


End file.
